


What Is Happening?

by RhiaFlammensang



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Attempt at Humor, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-03
Updated: 2020-11-03
Packaged: 2021-03-08 18:20:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,733
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27371083
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RhiaFlammensang/pseuds/RhiaFlammensang
Summary: What happens if a muggle happens upon the wrong platform, follows people into an oldtimey train and takes his time to realize, he was not where he should be. An experiment on how far a muggle could come on their unwilling way to hogwarts before someone catches on.
Kudos: 4





	What Is Happening?

Joshua stared around Kings Cross feeling completely lost. Behind him stood his heavy trunk. He was supposed to find platform 9 where a train to Calais would depart in half an hour. After his summer at his grandparents it was time to return to Germany, where school would start in a couple of weeks. But he was lost with all those stairs and trains on every single side of him. His english was alright for his twelve years but not fluent yet and he was confused by all those dialects around him which he didn`t know. Suddenly his ears picked up a loud female voice saying something about platform nine and something. In this exact moment he spotted a crowd of red haired people with a matron leading them on. Somehow he knew the voice had come from her. So he followed them a couple of stairs up and down and even though he really tried to concentrate on the way he was taking, he was too distracted by their strange luggage. There were real owls in far too small cages on their trunks and the youngest had a rat sitting on his shoulder. He tried to catch some words of their dialogue but none of it made any sense to him. Probably because they must be from the countryside. He contemplated the strange people he had to meet with his grandparents all summer long. None of them spoke clearly enough for him and he gave up trying to follow their speech somewhere after week two. Simply nodding and smiling. Smiling and nodding.

He did that now, so caught up in his memories. They were after all speaking all around him. Then they were sprinting and he followed quickly, maybe they were already late for their train. Something changed around him and he looked up to see a really old looking train and even more strange looking people around him.

Those British were so strange! Quickly following the red haired family, which didn`t seem to notice him, all concentrated on another black haired boy, he boarded the train and sat down in an empty compartment. He looked down on his watch and sighed in relief. Three minutes until 10 o`clock. He did it. Finally on his way back. At ten the train started and a couple of other kids joined him in his compartment, quickly realizing he couldn’t communicate well with them and leaving him alone to read in his book. Sometime around teatime , which he had picked up at his grandparents an old woman came with lots of candy which some kids bought, but after a disdainful glance at those unhealthy stuff he unpacked his sandwich with lots of green on it and continued reading. He glanced through the windows a couple of times but he could still not see the channel. He felt a bit queasy when it grew dark. Shouldn’t they already be in Calais? He checked his watch and realized it was already time for his second train from Calais to Berlin.

Where did they pick up such a huge delay? They hadn`t even halted once for other passengers to join them, he suddenly realized. Timidly he asked the children when they would arrive in Calais but got only strange looks and shaking heads. He really should have paid more attention at Kings Cross! But there seemed to be no way to get off the train before they got to their mysterious destination, so he could as well continue his reading and plan his way back to Germany when he knew where he had landed. About one hour later the train slowed down and stopped. The children were leaving and he suddenly noticed all of them wearing black robes.

Selfconscious he quickly put on his black coat. Last he wanted was to get noticed by someone who could proceed to check his ticket. He didn`t have enough money with him to pay some fee. He followed the children which were sitting with him. Someone told him to leave his luggage behind, it would be transported for him. With big timid eyes he clung to his backpack with all essentials and placed his trunk with the other ones. Even more owls in tiny cages! Someone really should call animal care! It was then, that he noticed this huge, boar like man bellowing for them to follow him. He exchanged timid glances with the other ones who seemed unsure as well but did as he was told. There was no real trainstation around him he realized, but at the sight before him he forgot about that as quickly as it had come to his mind. There was a huge lake with old boats on it in which they were supposed to get. Something strange happened to him and he remembered he had to get a train back home. He tried to walk back but the other children kept pushing him to the boats. Even though he knew there was something crucial he had to do, he had no other choice but to get into one of the boats. His parents are waiting on the trainstation in Berlin to pick him up. He needed to call them from a payphone.

Once again he tried to get up, panicked now. But the boats were already leaving the shore and someone pulled him back down. No one was rowing them and a new kind of fear settled into him. What was happening? He heard the giant man call something to them and a lot of exited gasps around them. Feeling sick with panic he turned to look what they were gasping at and frowned. A moldy, old ruin of a castle stood on a rock atop the lake, only illuminated from the moon behind it. He had seen grander castles and even grander ruins back in Germany. And even here in Britain with his grandparents. Why on earth would anyone be impressed by such an ugly thing? The nearer they got the bigger his panic grew, and he was almost sick. He really needed to get back to the train. They landed in a small cave beneath the ruin and everybody got off the boats. Tears had begun to run over his cheeks but he wasn`t allowed to stay in the boats and get back to where he came from and even the huge, bearded man came to soothe him. He stopped crying but more out of fear than anything else.

With downcast eyes and overcome by desperation he followed the others up the stairs. As they arrived on top of them, he felt yet another strange sensation and as he looked about, he felt as if caught in a bad dream. The place around him seemed to change from second to second. It looked like it had from outside, moldy, old, dirty, dark. But the next second it was well kept, illuminated by torches, with beautiful carvings and tapestries. But than the image changed back again. And again. He felt dizzy. Only with half a mind he noticed the old, stern looking woman who greeted them and brought them in some small room to wait there. It was easier for him there, the changes he was witnessing weren`t as big and startling in this chamber. He felt like he was losing his mind. The panic was gone now, replaced by perplexity. He closed his eyes and tried to make sense of what happened. Another round of gasps and airy sounding voices filled the air, but he wasn`t listening, instead concentrating on his mind and trying to wake up in case this all was really just a bad dream. But a sudden movement in the children around him pulled him back in what seemed to be reality and Joshua followed them in a great hall. The changes in his vision became less often, the bright, intact picture staying longer each time. But nonetheless he could still see the holes in the floor and feel the cold wind from the lake. It was really strange to see tables and long rows of students stretched over dark endless looking holes in the floor and to see bright tapestries in different colors hanging on non existent walls.

They now stood in front of a podium with old people sitting on a table facing the children behind them and a tattered stool placed in the middle with a hat on top. There was a voice filling the great hall but at first he couldn`t see where it was coming from. Only in the last verse he recognized it was the hat who was singing and his knee became wobbly. What was happening? Did he get some kind of head blow? The old woman from before now started calling out names and as the children got on the stool and put on the hat, it started to call different strange names. Everything became a blurry moment as he tried to wrap his thoughts around what was happening, but couldn`t. Only as it became silent, he managed to pull his attention back. He was alone in front of the stool and the old woman was mustering him confused, checking her list. The really really old looking guy in the middle called out: “Young man, please step forward and put on the hat so you can be sorted.” As the woman turned to look quizzical at the man, I stumbled forward and put on the hat. There was absolute silence. Then a cry of: “Muggle!”. Everyone gasped at that.

Shaking I took off the hat and stared around with wide eyes. The really old guy got up, took me by the arm and brought me back into the room, where I had waited before. He wanted to hear my story of how I came here. In awe he listened with twinkling eyes only to gratulate me afterwards. Bewildered I stared up at him. But he just smiled down at me, thanked me for pointing out the massive security lacks in the protection of the school and murmured something strange.

As I stood on platform nine at Kings Cross with my backpack over my shoulder and my luggage in my hand, waiting for the train to Calais to arrive, I wondered why I was so disturbed and kept thinking “What is happening?”.


End file.
